Science writing

Whether I'm delving into why consuming silver can turn your skin blue or sharing about glowing creatures, I love learning and writing about science and the natural world. Here's a smattering of the pieces I've written.

n undescribed species of hydromedusa in the genus Tetrorchis. This jelly is about 2.5 centimeters in diameter. Credit: Steve Haddock, MBARI

MOSS LANDING, California—Forget Mars. The next frontier in the search for undiscovered life forms may lie deep in the oceans of our own planet. Thousands of meters below the ocean’s surface, hulking underwater rovers probe the remote depths looking for mysterious creaturess

Bumblebees are not early risers. It’s nearly noon and none are out in the wildflower-filled meadow where Michelle Duennes, a researcher at the University of California, Riverside, looks for them and listens for buzzing.

“It should be bee city out here,” she says, eyeing the deep-purple lupine and delicate fuchsia shooting stars. Duennes is collecting bumblebees from all over California to study their health. This morning’s site is near Sonora Pass, high in the Sierra Nevada.

Goody, an 18-year-old reticulated giraffe at the Sacramento Zoo who suffers with arthritis, receives an X-ray. Goody wears a boot to help her walk and a Fitbit for staff to monitor her activity. Courtesy of the Sacramento Zoo

At 14 feet tall and nearly 1,600 pounds, Goody is an unusual arthritis patient. She’s also a reticulated giraffe and a celebrity of sorts at the Sacramento Zoo.

In addition to the attention and treats she gets from zoo visitors at the feeding deck of the giraffe exhibit, behind the scenes she receives care from the zoo’s veterinarians and keepers to manager her condition.

Shy of 3 inches with skin in muddy shades of red, green or brown, the foothill yellow-legged frog is unremarkable at first glance. Flipping it over, however, reveals the signature gold shading of its legs and lower abdomen that leads some to exclaim its beauty.

The amphibians used to be common in the foothill streams of mountain ranges across California, including the Sierra Nevada and Coast ranges. Now they’re gone from over half of their historical habitat in California, and scientists and wildlife advocates are worried about their survival.

Sometimes better flood protection comes from giving a river some space to roam. Hamilton City, 85 miles north of Sacramento, learned that lesson from a new levee project that both protects against flooding and restores wildlife habitat.

Here on Earth, the rise of autonomous vehicles looms large. But researchers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena are more interested in using that sort of automated decision-making to explore remote destinations in space

A new material can absorb up to 90 times its own weight in spilled oil and then be squeezed out like a sponge and reused, raising hopes for easier clean-up of oil spill sites.

This contrasts with most commercial products for soaking up oil, called “sorbents”. These are generally only good for a single use, acting like a paper towel used to mop up a kitchen mess and then tossed away. The discarded sorbents and oil are then normally incinerated.

As with medicines in our bodies, chemicals in the environment act and interact differently when multiple are present. For plants, insects, or microbes, chemical contaminants may be more or less toxic in combination than they are alone.

Located a few hours drive from Seattle, the North Cascades National Park showcases the majesty of mountains frosted with snow, the splendor of ancient trees reaching to the skies, and the jubilance of meadows bursting with wildflowers. Glaciers and volcanoes have shaped this landscape over millennia. The forces of nature pushed up mountain peaks, carved valleys, and dropped lakes like gems over the land, creating a region teeming with ecological diversity. Things here are still changing, but because of a different force: climate change.

High-level or long-term exposure to silver causes a disease known as argyria. Argyria permanently turns the skin a shocking shade of blue or gray. While this condition typically occurs because of silver ingestion, it can also result from the overzealous use of silver-containing nasal sprays and eye drops (neither of which is recommended by the FDA). Famously-blue Paul Karason was known as “Papa Smurf” (photo). He developed his azure hue from drinking a concoction of silver nanoparticles, a practice which he thought would improve his health.

Spring is here. In the forests of the Midwest, frogs are waking from their hibernation. Many of these frogs, including the spring peeper (Pseudaris crucifer) and the wood frog (Rana sylvatica), hibernate below the bark of trees or beneath leaf litter on the forest floor. As cold-blooded animals, they need heat from outside sources to maintain their body temperature. When the temperature drops, these frogs freeze.

“Don’t forget the sunscreen!” The imperative cried before a trip to the beach is an important one, with the pasty white lotion saving many a sunbather from sunburns and damage from the sun’s UV rays, which can lead to skin cancer. Many of these lotions use small, invisible nanoparticles of the minerals titanium dioxide and zinc oxide to save your skin. But when the warmth of the sun’s rays encourages us to splash in the waves on the beach, we do not usually think of where washed off sunscreen components are going. When these incredibly tiny nanoparticles enter the environment, they become pollutants and how they interact with light is cause for concern.

Recently I visited the Field Museum in an effort to start chipping away at the deficit in my cultural exploration of Chicago. It was a fun outing, though it ended with fatigue, a very saturated mind, and the satisfaction that my perusal of the exhibits was very thorough. Out of all the interesting exhibits I saw at the Field Museum, the one that most captivated my attention was one on lichens, “the coolest things you’ve never heard of.”

Things that glow have long captivated our imaginations. For me, the word “glow” itself evokes images of fairies and magical potions, or the latest Disney movie I’ve seen in which some luminous object is key to the storyline. Glow-ers of the natural world also provide beauty and fascination.

Like many Americans, I’ve lived under the assumption that the chemicals used in all sorts of everyday products are thoroughly tested and known to be safe. However, every so often, we’re reminded that this is not always the case.

When I was visiting family this past week, my mother-in-law shared with us how she uses her Fitbit to keep track of how much she exercises, how well she sleeps, what she has been eating, and other lifestyle information. The numbers she watches—her number of steps, caloric intake, and so on—are “metrics” of her health and though they don’t tell her everything, they allow her to measure progress in keeping her health goals on a day-to-day basis. Just like there are metrics that are helpful in tracking human health, it would be useful to have indicators for the health of the earth.